


Tattoo

by tscSNK (tsc)



Series: #ereriweek2015 [7]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Ereri Week, M/M, Trans Armin Arlert
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-07
Updated: 2015-06-07
Packaged: 2018-04-03 07:55:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,908
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4093051
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tsc/pseuds/tscSNK
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When one turns eighteen, the first words of their soulmate tattoo themselves onto their body.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tattoo

**Author's Note:**

> ereri week day seven: soul mates.
> 
> this was my failed nanowrimo project, names all switched for ereri week. i feel like i cheated, but i was never going to finish this chapter. enjoy!

“What do you think it’s going to say?”

Eren sat back against the pillows on his bed and sighed.  The boy was killing time on the last night of his seventeenth year, and his friend, Armin, had decided at nine o’clock that night that he would stop by unannounced. It was something he was good at, as he did it quite often, and Eren definitely didn’t mind the distraction.

“I don’t know…” Eren finally groaned, tossing his head to the side in an overdramatic sort of way, letting his dark brown bangs fall into his face.  He brushed them to the side after a moment as he swung his head back to look at his friend before shaking it.  “It could be anything. Besides, like, what if it’s something terrible?”

The blond boy that sat at the end of Eren’s bed let his head tilt back as a laugh escaped his mouth.

“Nothing, and I repeat, nothing could be as bad as what Mina got a few months ago, okay?  Right before prom, and right in the most visible place.  I heard she almost didn’t come!”

Eren thought about the fact for a moment before nodding.  “You have a point, Ar. She was definitely plagued with one of the worst pick-up lines known to man wrapped around her neck…”

 

It had been early spring when the young girl had stopped showing up for classes.  The first couple days it was shrugged off considering she had a reputation of partying, and the classmates had completely come to believe she had just overdone it and was still sick from her birthday celebrations.  But as the days turned into a week, which turned into two, people started to talk and the girl’s friends had finally managed to confront her to see what was going on.  Those same few friends managed to talk her back into returning to school.

The poor girl was traumatized, and for a while only wore turtlenecks to school.  Her friends knew what she was hiding, but it didn’t stop the rest of the school from spreading awful rumors.  Eren remembered specifically that there was one rumor that she had tried to kill herself, and the noose she had used had left a dreadful rope burn.

But as prom approached, Mina had become much more confident in herself, especially as more students around her turned eighteen. And as much as she didn’t want to go with the dress she had originally purchased so many months before the prom, she waltzed into the ballroom with her head held high and her friends around her for support anyway.  People stared at the words wrapped around her neck, and despite the few that had laughed, the majority understood.  Because there was neither a way to stop the tattoos from happening, nor any way to predict where they would wind up.

 

“I really hope I don’t end up with, ‘There’s a party in my pants and you’re invited,’ written on me anywhere, ever.” Eren finally said, crossing his legs in front of him on the bed.

Armin laughed once more and ran his hands through his long blond locks.  “Man, I would laugh for days if that happened.  I am sorry.”

The brunet couldn’t help but roll his eyes at the other’s statement.  “You fucking laugh at everything, moron.  You’ve got a rather strange sense of humour, especially at this time of night.”

The other boy sighed quietly and placed his hand over his heart, shaking his head.  “I am hurt.  How could you say such things to your best friend.”

Eren cocked his head to the side as he raised his eyebrow, a smirk slowly creeping up onto his lips.  “You assume that you’re my best friend.”

“I’m hurt!”

It was Eren’s turn to laugh out loud at that, only being cut off by a knock at his door.

“Come in!”  he called, wiping a tear from his eye as his mother’s head popped in.

The woman was fully dressed in her bedtime best, and her loose fitting blue housecoat draped over her shoulders.

“I just wanted to say goodnight.” She said, stifling a yawn with her hand.  “We’ve got an early start tomorrow.”

“Oh?  What’s happening tomorrow?”  Eren asked, frowning.

A small smile played on the woman’s lips for a moment before she shook her head.  “Never you mind.  You boys have fun though keep it down.  Your father fell asleep in front of the television again.”

Eren chuckled quietly and nodded. “Classic dad.”

After wishing the two goodnight once more, the woman quietly closed the door and the two boys heard her footsteps making their way back down the hall.

“Man, your mom is a babe.”

“ _Armin! No!_ ”

Armin had once again fallen into a fit of laughter, and Eren took the opportunity to grab one of the pillows beside him to whack his friend off of the bed, letting him fall to the floor with a loud thud.

“Rude!”

“Don’t call my mom a babe, man.”

“But she is!”

“Armin, that is so wrong.  She is basically you’re mom.”

The boy on the floor was howling with laughter again, holding his stomach as he hunched over his legs. His face was red and he had tears forming in his eyes.  Seeing this only made Eren laugh along with him and soon enough they were a mess, lying spread-eagled on the bed and the floor, trying to catch their breath.

“Oh, my god.”  Eren wheezed, rubbing his stomach.

“I haven’t laughed that hard since I was a little girl.”

At that, the brunet slowly turned his head to look down at the floor at his friend with raised eyebrows.

“I’m not sure if that is a joke or…”

“While it is true, I did mean for it to be a joke.” The boy on the floor smirked at that before finally pushing himself up to lean on his arms.  “You’re always so serious about it.  The words came from my own mouth, man.  I am not about to offend myself.”

“I know I was the first one to find out and all but I don’t want to hurt my best friend or anything if I laugh along.”

Armin completely ignored the first half of the statement and pointed right at Eren.  “So you admit that I am your best friend.  I knew it!”  Eren rolled his eyes at the boy’s statement and shook his head before the other spoke back up. “It takes a lot to offend me, Eren. You should at least know that by now.”

With a loud sigh, Eren let his head fall back against the headboard of his bed.  “I know.”

The small talk continued into the early hours of the morning, when both of them had forgotten about Eren’s birthday. It was the following morning when Armin was draped over the other’s body on the small twin-sized bed that Eren bolted upright, realizing the day.  The action sent Armin flying.

“What t’hell?”  Armin groaned as he hung off of the bed, holding himself up on his arm. He had been quick enough not to hit his head on the floor.

“It’s my birthday.”  Eren stated, a little louder than he had anticipated with a cracking voice.  He frantically pushed back the covers as Armin tried to push himself back up into a sitting position, squinting at his friend.

“Calm down, man.”

“It’s my birthday!”  the boy repeated, looking in the mirror.  “Where is it?”

Armin yawned and ran his hands through his hair. “I don’t see anything.” He mumbled before moving to rub his eyes.  “What time is it?”

Eren completely ignored the boy’s question and immediately started to pull off his clothes, not even caring about the fact there was another person in his room.  The shirt he had been wearing was ripped off the top half of his body and thrown into the corner of his room, smacking against the wall with a soft bump. The boy squinted as he looked at every detail of his chest, not knowing how big or small the writing would be. Unable to see anything, he turned around to try and see if anything was on his back, before turning back to Armin once more.

“Is there anything there?  I can’t see.” He asked, waving his hands beside his body frantically.  Every fibre of his being was excited, but scared.  He didn’t know what to expect.

“Nothing is there.” Armin muttered groggily, still trying to wake himself up.

“Shit.”  Eren cursed under his breath as he started pulling the string on his sweatpants, loosening them enough to push down over his legs.  He kicked them to the side and as soon as he looked back in the mirror, his eye’s widened.  “Oh, my god.”

“What?”

“Oh my fucking god.”

“What is it, Eren?”

Eren blinked a few times as his eyes ran over the backwards writing in the mirror, before looking down at it properly. “Oh my god.”

“Just turn around, Eren.”

“Are you having a fucking laugh, mate?” Eren said as he bent forward to read the writing scrawled across his thigh, just peeking out from the bottom of where the hem of his boxers sat.

“What?”

Eren turned around, holding up the leg of his shorts and pointing at his new tattoo.  “Are you having a fucking laugh, mate?”

It took Armin a few moments to register what was happening before the boy turned a shade of red.  Within seconds, he was falling onto his side in a fit of laughter.

“Yes, I really am.”  He cried.

“Are—Are you having a fucking—This is just—”

“Oh man.  Oh man, at least its somewhere where it can hide.  But oh man.  That one is good.”

“I don’t know how I feel about this.” Eren admitted, frowning down at the words as he propped his leg up onto his bed to see it better. “This is just—”

“Happy birthday!!” the boy’s words were cut off by his mother bursting into his room with two mugs of coffee.

Eren and Armin both turned to look at her with eyes the size of saucers, completely forgetting that there were other people in the house.  Eren hurriedly put his leg down and quickly tried to find his pants.

“Thanks mom.”  He mumbled, hopping on one foot as he tried to pull his pants on.

The woman at the door walked into the room a little more to set the mugs down on Eren’s desk and frowned.  “What is on your leg?”

“N-nothing.  Nothing at all.”

“Tell me!”

“It’s nothing, mom.”

“Eren Jaeger, what is on your leg?”

“Mother—”

“It’s a hickey, ma’am.”

“Armin!”  Eren cried, looking at his friend, horrified.

Armin sat on the bed with a smirk before glancing over to Mrs. Jaeger, who was ten shades of red.  Not even out of anger, but out of sheer embarrassment.

“I’m joking, I’m joking.”

“He’s definitely not serious, mom.”

“Well then, what is it?”

Eren had managed to get his pants back on properly before he sighed, pushing them back down on his right leg, enough to show the tattoo that had appeared sometime overnight.  His mother leaned over to read it, squinting before snorting.

“Really?”

“Really, really.”  Eren mumbled, hastily pulling his pants back up and tying the string.

“They sound like a real winner, Eren.” She said with a slight smirk, the redness still visible on her cheeks. “Anyway, you boys enjoy your coffee and there will be breakfast downstairs in a little while.”

“Thanks, mom.”

The woman stopped at the door, about to close it, before she turned back.  “And behave you two.”

Eren cleared his throat, feeling his face flush a deeper red as his door clicked shut, all the while Armin was killing himself laughing on the other side of the bed.

 

Years had passed since that morning and Eren had still not found the one.  That is, not until one incredibly boring Sunday afternoon.

Eren had just finished with exams for his second year in law school and wanted to take it easy.  The upside was that he could finally relax, while the downside was that no one else was free that particular day.

He had spent the morning sleeping until his body could no longer lay in his bed, and the early afternoon flipping channels from his couch in the living room.  He finally gave in and picked up his laptop as it got closer and closer to dinnertime.

The games didn’t keep him entertained, nor did the social media.  He sighed quietly to himself, knowing he couldn’t text Armin because he was out of the country, and he couldn’t get a hold of Mikasa as she’d be in the middle of a twelve-hour shift at the hospital.

Humming quietly to himself, Eren found himself logging into Omegle.  He was desperate for someone to talk to, and this was the only way to fill that void when literally everyone else he knew was busy.

He had passed by a few strangers that disconnected in the first few seconds, and the outcome was looking rather bleak. It wasn’t until a man showed up with a looked to be a costume of some sort.  The closer Eren looked, the more the camera started to focus and he covered his mouth as a snort erupted.

“What the actual fuck are you wearing?” he asked, realizing the person on the other side was wearing a gorilla suit, the mask tipped back and only their nose and eyes were visible over the top of the neck.

“Are you havin’ a fuckin’ laugh, mate?” the man slurred.

Any other time, Eren would have continued laughing but suddenly, a chill made it’s way down his spine and his eyes widened.

“What did you say?” he asked, getting closer to the computer.

“Oi, are you havin’ a fuckin’ laugh?” the man repeated, louder and more clear this time.  His accent was thick but Eren definitely heard him clearly.

“Holy fuck.”  Eren cried, covering his mouth.  “Holy fuck.”

“What?  What are you on about?”  the man asked, sitting up so his head was a bit more visible, his cheeks tinted pink from the liquor that was surely pumping through his veins.

“Not to pry or anything, but…” Eren trailed off, unsure of how to go about asking a stranger about their tattoos. “Did you get a tattoo when you woke up on your eighteenth birthday?”

The man scrunched his eyebrows and looked as though he was about to fall off whatever he was sitting on.  Eren panicked for a moment, hoping this wasn’t going to be the end of the conversation.  All was well once the man hiccupped, however.

“Of course I did.  The whole world does, don’t they?” he said, words still slightly slurred. “I haven’t thought about that thing for like ten years though.”

“What does yours say?”  Eren asked, hoping it wasn’t too forward.

“I suppose this is a good excuse to get out of this damn gorilla suit.” The man said, standing up.  Eren cocked his head to the side as he watched the man throw the head of the suit off of him before climbing out the top.

He stood in front of his camera in a pair of shorts and a wifebeater.  Eren watched as he ran his hands over his face and through his short, black hair. He watched as the man slowly lifted the hem of his shirt up to the top of his stomach, and it was then that he saw a scribble on the man’s hip, though illegible on his end of the video feed.

“What does it say?”  Eren asked, squinting at his screen.

The man bent forward and cleared his throat. “It says, ‘what the actual fuck are you we—‘ wait.”  The man stopped and looked up at his camera, wide eyes and instantly sober.  “Wait.”

“Holy fuck.”

“Wait, are you fucking serious?” The man cried, pointing at his camera.  “I need proof of this shit right now.”

With that, Eren stood from his seat and started to unbuckle his jeans as soon as his laptop was sitting on his coffee table.

“Yo, do I get a striptease out of this?”

Eren wiggled his hips playfully, though in no way seductive as he let his pants fall around his ankles.  He turned slightly before pulling up the bottom hem of his boxers, revealing the words tattooed on his thigh.

“Did I seriously say that?” The man asked before laughing.  “This is too fuckin’ weird, mate.”

Eren kicked his pants off of his ankles before falling back onto the couch.  He bent forward to lean his arms on his lap.

“Fucking weird is definitely the understatement of the year.”  He muttered quietly. “Had I not noticed, you would have missed it.”

“Shit.  That wasn’t a very good first impression, I’m sorry.” The man said, frowning. “I was at a costume party, hence the gorilla suit.  I’m also fuckin’ drunk has fuck, so I’m sorry for that.”

Eren laughed quietly and shook his head. “I don’t mind. You feeling alright?”

The man nodded and scratched the back of his head. “Yeah.  Sobered up slightly, but still my world is spinning.”

There was a pause before Eren spoke up. “What is your name, by the way? I’m Eren.”

The man looked up with a small smirk on his face. “I’m Levi.“

**Author's Note:**

> this week was fun and i can't wait for the next! thank you for reading!
> 
>  
> 
> [tumblr!](http://tscwrites.tumblr.com)
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> **by the way, this will be continued. this isn't the end, the rest will come when i've caught up on my other projects.**


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